​The past season of the Yesterday channel and AHC channel British conspiracy documentary series Forbidden History was the most boring it has yet produced. This year’s topic selection leaned away from the outrageous pseudohistory that had marked the program since its 2013 debut as a sort of British version of America Unearthed. Instead, most of this year’s episodes revolved around twentieth century history, with episodes about Mussolini, Hitler, the Vatican, East European totalitarian governments, etc. The subject matter wasn’t of much interest to me, so I did not review the series when it aired a few weeks ago. I caught an episode on the Knights Templar in rerun this week. It first aired in July, and it exemplifies exactly how a formerly wild and crazy series went wrong

​The most important way that the show has gone wrong is in its presentation of its subjects. Someone at one of its networks must have sent the show a network note about trying to be more respectable. They trimmed away much of the fringe history zaniness in favor of presenting a conventional account of their subjects with shorter and less insistent feints toward alternative ideas. In this episode, that meant that they devoted much of the narrative to a straightforward, if sensationalized, account of the fall of the Knights Templar and the accusations of heresy against them. Only occasionally did they reference, without source or evidence, allegations that the Templars carried treasure from France to Britain and America, or that they supposedly discovered the Ark of the Covenant.

Instead, most of the discussion focused on urine.

Go ahead and laugh, but I defy you to watch this episode without taking away one key point: that the Templars urinated on the Cross. The producers fed this line to each and every talking head, and they clearly asked each pundit to repeat the line. And then, in a fit of madness, perhaps born of what must have been the then-current Trump pee tape scandal, the producers used every single take, resulting in about ten different repetitions from all of the different talking heads of the exact same line about how the Templars urinated on the Cross. Now, it is true that under torture some Templar knights confessed to urination, but no evidence was ever found to substantiate the claim. Fringe history C-listers like Andrew Gough (a cut-rate Giorgio Tsoukalos), Lynn Picknett (a smarter Linda Moulton Howe), and Linda Papadopoulos (an unholy hybrid of Fox News and Ancient Aliens) all smirk their way through talk about spit and urine as though they were giddily revealing some secret truth. All of them take the Church’s account of the Templar heresies pretty much at face value and speculate wildly about what the Templar knights were “really” up to in their secret rites. The explanations are odd and bizarre. One asserted confidently that the Templars did not go “full Islamic” but probably adopted Islamic beliefs about Jesus surviving the Cross. Papadopoulos suggested that the Templar gatherings had the air of all-male fraternity hazing events, and she speculated that the excess of “testosterone” at these events led to roughhousing, and she heavily implied, perhaps in reflection of her own secret fantasies, that whenever men gather alone in groups they engage in sex games and orgies. Gough offered two views, that the Church was right and the Templars had gone “dark,” and that these “dark” rites like worshiping a severed head were really misunderstood Gnostic rites or fraternal tests, or something like that. Really, he’ll just say anything.

At the end of the hour, there wasn’t really anything new presented. Despite promising a new and different take on the Templars, the documentary approached the conventional, but was undercut by its reliance on glib and aggressively ignorant fringe historians instead of real experts, a few of which (or at least people who seemed like real experts—I didn’t get all their names to check their credentials) pop up for short intervals between the scripted logorrhea of the regular cast.

When Forbidden History started, it chronicled the adventures of onetime Top of the Pops presenter Jamie Theakston investigating historical mysteries of special interest to fringe history believers. The first seasons began episodes with Theakston presenting a topic, and he would travel the world and conduct interviews and conclude the broadcast with some milquetoast thoughts. AHC reedited episodes to replace Theakston’s voiceover with an American narrator, and I have not seen the British broadcasts of the current season to know what additional changes AHC has made. But in the episodes as they air on AHC, Theakston’s role has been minimized. While he offered some mild commentary in the Vatican episode, the Templar episode hummed along almost entirely without his participation. He conducted, so far as I saw, one interview, in England, and the rest of the show was a collection of C-list fringe history talking heads, the program’s regular cast, with a few sound bites from authors of Templar books.

The end result is a program that is more conventional, less interesting, and more repetitive than ever before. It is, ultimately, a waste of time, televisual wallpaper for people who want to watch something, and don’t really want to pay much attention to what’s on the screen. It seems strange for me to say that a show was better when it was less truthful, but if they do not want to spend the time, money, and effort to be serious and factual, they could at least be entertaining.

While they were talking about the Templars' supposed bizarre secret practices, they could have made a point that's actually relevant today: you can torture people into saying any damn thing you want. That's where the urine came from, it's where the Baphomet came from, and it's where those stupid Templar ships came from.

But nobody will admit that, in this age of terrorism and enhanced interrogation, and so all we have to remind us is an episode from a fictional TV series from 25 years ago. There are four lights.

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Denise Spear

9/2/2017 12:49:27 pm

Interesting I always thought (in my limited exposure) that Andrew Gough was more interesting than Giorgio Tsoukalos. In some series (maybe because of editing) He seems to be articulate, with a almost melodic way of speaking. Making him SEEM more reasonable than the AAT heads. I know he is a fringe editor and such but I enjoy his"performances more than Giorgio's.

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Clete

9/2/2017 01:22:08 pm

I had an interesting idea, how much smarter would you have to be to be smarter than Linda Moulton Howe. I mean, I have a house plant that is probably smarter than she is.

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Only Me

9/2/2017 04:21:39 pm

No, no, no. Scott Wolter already told us the Templars were into ritualistic bathing. Such hygienic folk wouldn't pee on the Cross for initiation purposes.

Seriously, though, who would take such claims as true? As Not the Comte de Saint Germain pointed out, you can make anyone say anything under torture. Case in point: I consider these fringe shows torture, so I'd say anything if it meant they'd be taken off the air.

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Chuckles the Clown

9/2/2017 05:12:31 pm

The disrespect for the cross does not come from Muslims. It comes from Arians (not Aryans) and Cathars. They believed Christ was a man and was not crucified. The legend of the missing Templar fleet is explained by who Roger de Flor is and the Catalan Company. Look it up if you don't know about it. See Albiginsian Crusade and fourth Crusade to understand more about all this. smh

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Americanegro

9/2/2017 05:25:25 pm

OR, you could give an "elevator presentation" about why anyone should bother.

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Pacal

9/6/2017 07:28:50 pm

Arian's did not believe that Jesus was a man. They believed that contrary to what became Church dogma Jesus was not equal to the Father in the conventional doctrine of the Trinity. Instead Jesus was believed to be subordinate to the Father, however he was not thought of has merely a man but a subordinate part of the Godhead. further Arian's believed Jesus was in fact crucified.

As for the Cathars. Assuming that it is possible to take seriously the surviving documents that talk about their doctrines, a position that has problems. It is possible that what we think of has Cathar beliefs is a collection of cliches and stereotypes based on "orthodox" views of dualistic beliefs.

Taking those accounts seriously it would appear that the Cathars were dualists who believed that the material world was evil and that Jesus being the bearer of glad tidings would not pollute himself by imprisoning himself in evil matter. So Jesus was viewed by the Cathars has merely looking like he was material when in fact he was not. In this view Jesus was, being non-material , was never really crucified he merely returned to the godly good light away from evil dark matter.

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Americanegro

9/2/2017 05:23:35 pm

We had a similar uproar in the 80s with "Piss Christ". I'd be interested to know, did they admit to whizzing on a cross or a crucifix?

When Homer Simpson stayed home on Sunday instead of going to church:

"I'm whizzing with the door open!"

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Joe Scales

9/2/2017 09:29:40 pm

This Templar material was obviously not properly vetted. You know, not through a hunt club in rural Maine like the good stuff...

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TONY S.

9/2/2017 10:28:40 pm

"Andrew Gough, a cut rate Giorgio Tsoukalos" - perfect description.

"... glib and aggressively ignorant fringe historians..." - right on the money.

Listening to these people speculate on what they think the Templars "may really have been doing", it sounds like they are engaging in projecting their own personal, dark little fantasies onto the subject. I wonder how many of them, had they lived back then, would've dropped their house keys in a bowl at the front door and go on in, if the meetings had been open to the public.

I almost feel sad for them that in their obsession for the fringe they will never learn or understand just how fascinating, rich and rewarding authentic history really is.

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Oregano

9/2/2017 11:47:37 pm

Those last three posts? That's the REAL Holy Trinity! When Catholic priests stop touching boys, I'll care about where the Templars pissed.

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Jim

9/3/2017 03:59:45 pm

Somewhat unrelated, but in the Templar theme;
Scott Wolter has gone to Nova Scotia Canada and absconded with samples of the Overton Stone. One has to wonder if he acquired any sort of permission to do this !
Also he seems to think a crescent or banana shape indicates Venus, I guess we can add astronomy to the list of things he doesn't know spit about.

And what the hell is "an egg shaped line"?? It's an oval, Scott! We have a word for that in English!

I checked his website earlier today but this article wasn't up yet. Thank you, you made my day.

Jim

9/3/2017 08:01:36 pm

His leaps of logic are astounding,,, lol,,,
crescent moon = Venus = Holy Mother = shared ideological views !! So, apparently, the Mi’kmaq tribe and the Templars both worshiped the Roman Goddess Venus whose symbol is a crescent moon ( or a banana, whatever that carving is ) . I guess the Romans were here after all !!!

Joe Scales

9/3/2017 10:32:56 pm

Gee, I wonder what his weathering conclusions are going to be. Well... actually, I can pretty much guess. He'll pick and choose from this acoustic scientist's speculations and go with Portuguese Templars a couple hundred years earlier, but only because rocks don't lie:

http://www.neara.org/images/OvertonStone.pdf

Americanegro

9/3/2017 08:53:34 pm

Scott Wolter is an idiot.

He does not know what a tobacco leaf looks like.

The thing he calls "a feather" looks more like a tobacco leaf than the supposed "tobacco leaves".

"Immediately left of the cross is what some say is a leaf, but to me it looks like a feather carved in detail."

Keep in mind that when Wolter says "left" he means what a normal person means by "right". He LITERALLY does not know left from right.

And of course the completely imaginary Indian Goddess culture.

And of course the completely imaginary Portuguese Templar Goddess culture.

I suspect that somewhere Andre Kovac is working on a question.

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Jim

9/3/2017 11:19:22 pm

Haha,,, " He LITERALLY does not know left from right." I missed that.
He also stated that the 4 dots are at the cardinal points,,,, apparently North is now straight up in the sky, and if you are going South you best pack a shovel.

What a fool. Did he just admit to going onto private posted land damaging and removing parts of what may be a historic monument with no permission from the landowner nor the government ?
But I guess it's OK, cause he arrogantly proclaims;
"No, a permit wasn’t necessary for our visit."
This from his answers
" It’s on private land and is posted with signs, but we were told as long as you stayed on the trail it was OK to visit the site. "

Jim

9/4/2017 03:51:29 pm

Also, he becomes evasive when asked about the first reported sighting :

"To my knowledge, the carvings were only made public a few years ago. However, I’m sure it’s been known locally for a long time."

Since when does private posted land equate to " made public "?
The truth according to the link Joe gave (a few posts above) is this site has been a popular area with the locals for years if not generations, yet no one noticed these carvings in a very large prominent boulder until 2009 ?????
But hey,,,,,,as long as Scott is sure it’s been known locally for a long time.

Joe Scales

9/4/2017 09:33:19 pm

If Wolter was smart... and of course he isn't... he'd recall the lessons he should have learned from the AVM rune stone and his Mustang Mountain mystery. He should limit his falsification of history solely to hoaxes where the perpetrator is long gone.

DPBROKAW

9/7/2017 01:27:06 pm

A present moon in now a present "Venus", to fit in with the whole goddess worship angle. Can you make out a cresent of the planet Venus? Without a telescope?

Americanegro

9/7/2017 03:09:49 pm

I could be wrong, but it's hard to imagine seeing a Whole Venus except when it transits the sun, because it's always inside the orbit of the Earth. So we see Crescent Venuses from time to time (I think), but you're right, making it out without a telescope would be a problem.

Wolter ignores the fact that the Moon has long been a symbol of "the Feminine" because in his Unified Theory of Crackpot, The Feminine is Venus.

Mrs Grimble

9/6/2017 09:15:03 am

A tobacco leaf? It looks to me like a banana leaf, superimposed over a banana. The curved object under them both could be another banana, or perhaps a chili pepper.
And how did the Mi'kmaq tribe know about bananas and peppers? Why, from the Atlanteans, of course!
(Though, seriously - check out the Mi'kmaq flag here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grand_Council_(Mi%27kmaq)#/media/File:Mikmaq_State_Flag_(vertical).svg A crescent, a star *and* a cross??)

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B L

9/7/2017 01:04:49 pm

Mi'kmaq flag?!! That looks like an inverted Templar battle flag to me!! You may have just discovered the one clue that pulls this whole Henry Sinclair thing together!! :)

Americanegro

9/4/2017 03:58:25 pm

First, it must be said:

Scott Wolter is an idiot.

Yes!! If there were an entry for "not smart" in the dictionary...

It occurred to me just now, since there are three themes going on on this rock, maybe this is a hoaxer's practice rock. I'm surprised he didn't spot the Ogham on it.

"We were told" NOT "The property owner told us". I wonder if the folks at amengtest.com endorse this sort of thing.

And he says in effect "you're right, the next step is to talk to "indigenous" people". Uh, like THE PROPERTY OWNER, SCOTT?

Scott Wolter is an idiot.

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Jim

9/4/2017 07:51:12 pm

Some tidbits of Nova Scotia Law , (page 13) :

No person shall carry out explorations or make excavations on any land in the Province, including land covered with water, for the purpose of seeking archaeological resources without a Heritage Research Permit (Archaeology)

No Person shall
(a) knowingly destroy, desecrate, deface or alter archaeological resources whether designated or not ;
(b)
excavate or otherwise alter an archaeological site or remove any objects from an archaeological site unless he is the holder of a Heritage Research Permit (Archaeology). R.S., c. 438, s.
12
A permit issued under this Act does not authorize the permit holder to enter upon lands or remove heritage objects therefrom without the consent of the owner or person entitled to grant consent. R.S., c. 438, s. 9.(a)

Surely, you guys aren't suggesting that Wolter would try to nefariously skirt around the permission issue ala season 1 episode 8, "Chamber Hunting"? And besides, I'm sure his XplrR partner, JHP, was making sure he had all his T's crossed and I's dotted properly, after all, JHP did write THE definitive book on ALL the laws everywhere in the world pertaining to treasure and artifact digging, hunting, and gathering.

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Jim

9/5/2017 11:40:46 am

Wolter is somewhat vague, but my take from his comments is that Instead of getting permission from the owner of the posted land and proper Government permits, he got permission from some random dude he bumped into.

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Jim

9/5/2017 12:37:47 pm

One also has to wonder what laws pertain to hammering off a souvenir of what may be a historically significant artifact and transporting it across an International border ?????
Somewhat akin to their (giant) human remains tampering, where they claimed it wasn't in the USA so it was OK and not illegal.

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Americanegro

9/5/2017 03:09:20 pm

He did it in his role as a professional geologist, so it was okay.

Joe Scales

9/6/2017 12:57:08 pm

Now Wolter is lying about peer review again. Some things never change. It's also pretty funny that he's using Alice Kehoe to back him up on the KRS when she specifically bashed America Unearthed in her latest book. Just like Richard Nielsen. Just like Henrik Williams. They all retract support for him when his pathological mendacity reveals itself.

Will he ever start calling Professor Kehoe names, as is his creed when he is contradicted? For now he's pretending she still supports him, and I seriously doubt he'll publicly let himself be called out on this ruse should anyone attempt to point it out.

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Mike Morgan

9/6/2017 04:14:38 pm

"Altogether, the geologists' studies of the stone, in 1910 and 2000, the affidavits from Winchell's interviews, the resolution of alleged errors in the inscription language, and the unique historical circumstances in Scandinavia in 1362, correlate physical, linguistic, and historical data all weighing the probability of authenticity and finding it plausible." (Kehoe 2005)

"... probability of authenticity and finding it plausible." PLAUSIBLE!!!!

Well short of a ringing endorsement in my book.

Jim

9/6/2017 06:08:19 pm

Mike, do you know if she wrote any more on Wolter in her book or elsewhere ?
Unless she wrote more on Wolters work, it also falls rather short of what I would consider a "peer review". Not even mentioning him by name.

Mike Morgan

9/6/2017 08:34:17 pm

Jim,

I have not read any of Alice Kehoe's works except for an excerpt, in which I found the above, from what I assume is her latest book and the one Joe Scales may be eluding too, "Traveling Prehistoric Seas: Critical Thinking on Ancient Transoceanic Voyages". The excerpt I read does not mention Wolter by name, nor any others involved in that *study*, only Newton Winchell is named. Joe Scales or Jason may be able to provide more information.

I did a Google search for "Alice Kehoe america unearthed" and clicked on the link to google books. Directly below where you land, there is just a mention of "America Unearthed" under the heading "North Atlantic - Speculative Claims" along with Templars, Sinclair, Madoc, and "blond indians", but, again, silence on a name. Scrolling above from the "hit" point, "North Atlantic - Norse" is also an interesting read.

Jim

9/6/2017 10:04:42 pm

Thanks Mike, I think Wolters reference to Professor Kehoe may have just been a red herring to get off the topic of peer review. I may start referring to him as Grima.
Here is an interesting conversation with a 2006 email from Wolter naming the people he claims to have peer reviewed his work.

Jim, here's a post I made here about a month ago in another topic which addresses Wolter's situation with Kehoe:

------------- Folks might have missed this when Wolter stupidly made it available on his blog when claiming it amounted to "peer review":

https://s3-us-west-2.amazonaws.com/wolter/Alice+Kehoe.pdf (might want to get to this before Wolter takes it down)

Basically, it is Alice Beck Kehoe pleading with him in personal correspondence not to go in the direction he'd already chosen to go back in 2005. She actually implored Wolter not to "kill" the KRS with the Dan Brown nonsense, not to regard the KRS as a "land claim" and tried to steer him to a more reputable source in regard to Templars ("Laurence Gardner is 'very untrustworthy'"). Of course Wolter ignored her pleas.

So although Kehoe praised Wolter's "science" in her 2005 book on reevaluating the Kensington Rune Stone holistically, in her 2016 book, Traveling Prehistoric Seas, she leaves Wolter's name out of her chapter still justifying the KRS as probably authentic, instead referring to him as only the unnamed "geologist" in Neilsen's scanning project, who dug up what she relies more on... buckle up folks... Winchell's science. Ouch! As for Wolter, perhaps this subsequent passage of "speculative claims" gives you a taste of her current regard for him:

"Television addicts may have seen films on the so-called History Channel 2, or a series on that channel called America Unearthed, claiming medieval Knights Templar crossed to America when their order was banned by a French king. With them, say some of the writers of mostly self-published books used in the television films, the Templars carried the legendary Holy Grail, either a golden chalice or the young descendant of the marriage of Jesus of Nazareth and Mary Magdalene. Neither the chalice nor trace of Jesus' descendant have been found, nor any evidence of medieval Knights Templar in America... No contemporary record has been found of any transatlantic voyage by Henry Sinclair. Instead, the sagas and historical documents relating to Orkney in his time are full of bloody contests between Norwegian and Scottish barons, including Sinclair himself fighting cousins disputing his holding. Sailing to America would have unwisely left his earldom easy prey to those cousins."

Double-Ouch! Take that Wolter, as yet another academic turns on him. However, I admit that it is intellectually dishonest for Kehoe to still justify the KRS as authentic when she necessarily relied on Wolter to do so, and then savages him in her subsequent book. --------------

You can try to bring this up with Wolter on his blog, but it would be a waste of time in my view Jim, as he'll either ignore the current state of affairs or lie about it.

Jim

9/7/2017 10:50:03 am

Thanks, I find his blog highly entertaining but don't see much point commenting there. He simply deletes the most troubling comments, and rarely gives a straight answer to anyone questioning his work.
Case in point, what I mentioned a few posts above.

Also, he becomes evasive when asked about the first reported sighting :

"To my knowledge, the carvings were only made public a few years ago. However, I’m sure it’s been known locally for a long time."

Utter claptrap, they were first reported in 2009 !!!! And I am pretty sure he knows it.

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Joe Scales

9/7/2017 11:57:03 am

I see this Overton Stone situation as one of desperation for Wolter. It's a huge risk for him to apply his fake science to date the carvings, given how recently they were discovered. The AVM stone was a near miss in this regard, as he hadn't publicly come out with his findings before the hoaxers revealed themselves. But I see a photograph of a clean Overton rock, taken some time prior to 2009, in his future. Call it a premonition.

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Americanegro

9/7/2017 12:58:45 pm

Minor fiddle: I don't think Wolter deletes posts, he's the approver so if he really doesn't like something it never sees the light of day. For example Andre via email told me he asked if taking samples from posted private property without the owner's permission was kind of stealing. That post didn't make the cut, which suggests the answer is "yes".

Wolter talks about "hopefully with permission of the Miqmaq" but says nothing about the actual owner.

Scott Wolter is an idiot.

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Jim

9/7/2017 01:50:11 pm

I could be wrong, but I think he has taken down posts, especially when he gets into it with his pet peeves. That being anonymous posters.

Americanegro

9/7/2017 03:10:57 pm

I could be wrong too, but he's still an idiot.

Joe Scales

9/7/2017 03:53:46 pm

To his credit, I haven't witnessed Wolter deleting remarks, but he will refuse to publish when cornered. I just went back and looked to see if certain comments from a year and a half ago were still there. Back then I had come back to comment on his blog when he offered a truce with a mandate to converse politely with each other (which I had always done anyway). Of course he couldn't hold to it, and actually told his readers that he refused to publish the second part of a lengthy post of mine because I was Dick Nielsen in disguise. Yes, he would revisit this in future blog posts, telling his readers he had solved the Joe Scales riddle for certain. Then Dick died.

Joe

12/7/2018 05:20:59 pm

Guy Walters assertion in the show that no ships left La Rochelle is absurd. There is testimony that ships in fact left from multiple ports. Ask yourself Guy; why was it that so little was found and confiscated? Its because they had some lead time before the hammer fell and removed money and valuables. A little over 600 Templars were arrested, but there were over 3000 Templars in France alone. The rest fled and joined their brothers elsewhere. Silly commentators in this show like Guy Walters is what makes it lose credibility.

As recorded in testimony of the Knight Jean de Châlon, the Templars had advance warning of the impending raid, and arranged a fleet of 18 galley ships to leave Port La Rochelle, visibly leaving behind a couple ships to avoid raising suspicions of their escape [1]. This testimony during the trials specified that “Gerard de Villiers, the Paris Preceptor, had escaped with 50 horses and 18 ships.” - Alan Butler and Stephen Dafoe, The Warriors and the Bankers, Lewis Masonic, Surrey, England (2006), p.25.

Walters and many of the other fringe so-called "experts" ruined the show.

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